elevator

I just want to make one more analogy on this one. Say that you dumped out a garbage can and you see garbage everywhere, except one diamond (Earth). My analogy adds this: say now that all over the universe about 1 trillion other garbage cans are being emptied too; however we are, because of our limited technological abilities, unable to see the contents of the trash within those garbage cans.

I think it is unreasonable to imagine that our garbage can is in some way special or unique from the other 1 trillion other garbage cans; because we have no idea what those garbage cans contain. What if every garbage can contained at least one diamond? What if 10% of all garbage cans contained a diamond? And this is my objection. You cannot know that Earth is the only place in the universe that has life. In fact, the shear size of the universe should be a fantastic indication that our presence in the universe is fairly insignificant to the whole.

Or, if you imagine the garbage can to the big-bang itself. Imagine then that we are unable to see approximately one-trillionth of the contents of the garbage can. Think about that number for a second. How is it reasonable to imagine a diamond to be special when our observational skills are so spectacularly inept?

Booky

:bulb: That I see as a really cheap shot.

Nobody is great or famous or changed the world without their followers.

We have as much evidence for Jesus living as we do that Alexander the Great lived.

There is no true picture of Alexander, no written text from that person, no eye witness account, no dead body,
what we do have is only stories, legends and his followers for Alexander, and yet he was great too and he too changed the world.

:banghead:

Booky

If you only look for God in the supernatural then there is no reason to expect you to see God in the natural.

The fact that the seed becomes a plant through sound and sensible poccesses like biology and evolution is saying there is intelligence in that process = intelligent design.

If a bean seed popped up into a mystical bean stalk, then that would be evidence of magic beans and not intelligent design.

Miracles are not intelligent design - biology and chemistry, physics, etc., etc., are the signs of intelligence.

I say you are mixing up a version of "God" in with intelligent design.

I like the concept of "intelligent design" because that cuts out the denominations and it can be any form of God instead of the Orthodox kind.

The sciece God of "Nature" is an intelligence since it functions by repeated and logical rules.

The "big bang" does not show us any mystical "God" but it does show a process the flows in an intelligent way - thus intelligent design.

Otherwise we would have to call the laws of physics as happen-chance if the big bang is not ruled by intelligent laws.

:worried: The sad fact is that I might leave this Forum soon, because I thought it had "infidels" here and not simple heathen.

I do not want to debate with idiots.

An "infidel" means some one that is unfaithful to their "Orthodoxy" like infidelity, but to deny God is to be an unbeliever - a heathen.

And I do realize that Atheist have apropriated the term of "infidel" as their own, but it is an incorrect usage.

So I am NOT going to a different thread or another Forum or anywhere to argue nonsense with heathens because it would be "casting pearls before swine".

And it was my impression that this forum being title "Biblical Criticism" meant professional type critique-ing link and not just petty denials.

:huh: You contradict yourself big time and illogically.

First you say there is no intelligent design, and then you describe how so many things are designed intelligently.

:wave: I believe it was Gandhi and not the Buddha that said that quote, but either way - I very much agree with it too.

And I agree that any supernatural is not the proof at all, the proof is in the logical and reasonable dictates like physics and scientific procedures because that is what intelligent design means.

:bulb:

elevator

Are you saying that the claim that God exists is not a supernatural claim? In that case I must disagree. And again, DNA, the blueprint of all living entities, is a well-known and well-researched area of biology that explains how a seed becomes a plant. Again, please check out the podcast I mentioned. There are several episodes there on the molecular evidence for evolution explained in very easy to understand ways.

The only way that you can assert that what you are saying above is true, is by declaring that you believe it on insufficient evidence. There is no observational or empirical evidence that you can present that will prove to any scientist in the appropriate fields that any biological entity, chemical compound or law of physics was designed by God (let alone a Christian God). And so the only way for me to accept what you say as truth; is to take a leap of faith and just believe you. Unfortunately, I cannot do that.

I agree with one of your statements; no line of argumentation can be used to prove the existence of the God of any particular denomination. What believers must do is simply argue the existence of “a God”. But even if you assert the existence of just “a God”, you’re still left with the task of proving that the existence of “a God” is likely. The “big bang” won’t do it; there is simply nothing about the “big bang” that indicates that an intelligent agent was behind it. It could just as well have been the result of a “big crunch” from a previous existence, or it could have been the result of the “M theory” multidimensional interaction between parallel universes. I am not saying that any of those are right; all I am saying is that it is absurd to claim that you know! How can you know? How can you pretend to know that God set in motion the “big bang” and that he currently dictates the designs of contemporary biological lifeforms? My stance is easy; “I don’t know”. And I have found nothing in your arguments that even remotely would encourage any non-believer to start believing.

You must have expected to find non-believers on this forum? I mean surely you didn’t come to this forum expecting to find a number of people who agree with you or would be easily persuaded to belief by you?

I am not even a non-believer though. I am very much open to the possibility that God exists. But only if the evidence for God outweighs that of his non-existence. I feel that you arguments have done nothing to prove the existence of God; in fact your arguments are very similar to those I have heard on this board many times before. That said though; I don’t wish you to leave this forum, it is obvious that you believe strongly what you argue, and I think it is important for believers and non-believers to come together and critique each other’s arguments – without having to resort to name-calling of course!

You misunderstand again. I am not describing how things are designed intelligently, those are your words. Quote me where I said that? I said that when things are assumed to be intelligently designed, most often it is because of the lack of knowledge of that particular subject. I gave examples of Dr. Behe’s claims to intelligently designed biological (and a few non-biological) mechanisms because he saw them as being irreducibly complex. However, science has shown that many of these irreducible complex systems do in fact have an evolutionary predecessor.

I assure you; it was the Buddha. In any event; it rings true and it is from the same reasoning that I feel I cannot agree with your arguments.

aa5874

Your statement is completely erroneous. There is simply no evidence for Jesus of the NT.

Jesus was not written about by the well known credible non-apologetic sources of antiquity.

It cannot be said Jesus existed because there are no pictures of Alexander or no written text from him, and no dead body, because if that is the case, then Achilles, Zeus and Apollo, Dionysus and all other figures of antiquity did exist, since we have no true pictures, no written text and no dead bodies of them.

Jesus is considered to not have existed because virtually all the information about him are implausible, apologetic, fundamentally fictitious and not corroborated by any non-apologetic external sources.

Toto

There is much more evidence for the existence of Alexander than for Jesus. The apologetic assertion to the contrary has been debunked so often and so thoroughly that I will not even take the time to reference it, but in short, we have references by companions of Alexander to his life, we have conemporary reactions by his enemies, we have coins with his name. We know what he looked like, who his parents were, who he married. There is nothing like that for Jesus.

Booky

:notworthy: Yes, that is what I am saying matter of factly.

You are correct in that it is a supernatural claim by Orthodox religions and I agree that most of them are blind and dumb concerning their own subject.

But by viewing a God as a Creator and inside of "intelligent design" then THEN it is not a supernatural claim at all.

So my point - if I may - is that I am trying to preach a new improved perception and not the old worn out claims.

Therefore I say you are correct in your statement quoted above except that you are viewing me and my claims as if I were preaching the same old dead Orthodoxies and I am not.

:Cheeky: I am not challenging DNA or evolution, completely the opposite, because I am saying both the DNA and the evolution is the proof for intelligent design.

It is like a goldfish trying to figure out that their fish tank is an artificial enviroment simply because the DNA does fit together and the evolving into a higher and better condition means it is evolving in a smarter (intelligent) way and not a degrading way as un-intelligent.

If life was evolving down into a degraded state instead of upward then it would be proof PROOF of an un-intelligent design.

:banghead: I do believe that scientist are incredibly biased (against any perception of a God) and you seem to be too, and most people simply will not see what they do not want to see.

Therefore I agree with what you said above, and I am saying that if you and the scientist would try not to see any "God" but to see the intelligence in the scientific findings, because that is the proof of intelligent design.
NOT the Christian God, and not any Orthodox form of God.

I agree that you (many others) have taken the easy way, and I have not.

The "big bang" is not sufficient and I agree but it is a proof as in one more piece of the puzzle.

The bigger proofs are told in the Bible Like particularly "The United States and Britain in Prophesy" link HERE.

I do know that I hate being referenced to a book, and I hate it that I am giving a link to a book, but reading is the way us humans communicate and educate so there it is.

:wide: I do not surrender my own vanity, and so I always hope that a new group will mesh perfectly with me, and some places are better then others.

I find non-believers everywhere I go, and I see Orthodox religions as non-believers in my book.

What I hoped to find was some true religious infidels like myself.

I see infidel like infidelity in a marriage, so if you break-up then it is not infidelity nor infidel any more, and I am a non-Orthodox Christian and thus unfaithful to that.

When the Muslims in Iran or Bin Laden calls Americans as infidels then they only means infidelity to Christianity because we are viewed as a Christian Country.

One can only be unfaithful to their mate as an infidel, because after a break-up then their is no infidelity.

:Cheeky: Name calling is not acceptable in many or most cases but I do not often object to names called on me.

I called people "heathen" because it is a more correct name for a nonbeliever in my view, but I will not push it here. And the "swine" is a Bible quote and it has much meaning to me, but again I shall try not to push that one here either - any more.

:blush: I did not mis-understand, it was I that was declaring your words as pointing the the intelligent design.

You describe things like DNA works so well and that means intelligence, if the DNA works degenerately then that would show an un-intelligent design.

That is what I meant.

:notworthy: Again, I SAY, in your words above is the proof that the design was intelligent and complex ...

Even evolution is an intelligent process.

Life evolves into betterment and not down into degredation as un-intelligent would do.

:bulb: Hey, I thought of a compromise solution to this.

Maybe it was that I heard it from Mahatma Gandhi and Gandhi heard it from the Buddha as you did too, and so we are both sort of correct.

Hows that? :wave:

Booky

:redface: The writings of Josephus are very authoritarian as a witness testimonial.

And he was an "apologist" for the Jews but not for the Christians nor for the persons he called John the Baptist or Jesus the Christ, since Josephus did not write flattering words concerning them. He only gave apologetics for his own Orthodox Judaneans.

The history of Alexander was written some 300 years after he died, and there are no eye witness account of him at all.

:Cheeky: I most certainly am not saying that Jesus existance is in any way related or connected to the circumstances concerning Alexander.

What I am saying is that there is far more evidence affirming the existance of the man people call Jesus then there is evidence for the existance of the man called Alexander the Great.

Claiming the miracles are imposible does not mean the man or His movement is imposible too. Not.

:huh: Even if I concede that the person of Jesus never existed (hypothetically since I do not concede it) then His fundamental principles are proven as sound by His followers that proceeded to do great things thereby.

As I said before; Nobody is great or famous or changed the world without their followers.

Even things like the idea of atomic energy was nothing until some later followers put it into action.

The ideas have power in them self even if the man did not exist at all.

:bulb:

Booky

:devil1: What I said has held up as being found as accurate and true, link HERE. :jump:

Toto

Your link goes to your previous post, which just references Wikipedia. :huh:

The Wikipedia article notes that the primary sources written by those who knew Alexander are lost, but that these primary sources were used by other sources that survive. You can show nothing like this for Jesus.